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Show 6 The Daily Utan cnronicie, reoruary u, ijm - f m StudsiTuology booth at Sateway store BY TOM HORTON Chronicle Staff A trend is beginning which may not pause until it gets to the corner grocery store. The trend's latest and most ambitious expression is the estab lishment of an ecology booth at the Safeway food store on Fourth South at Ninth East. The booth was conceived, organized and is manned by University students, and deals with specific steps the consumer can take in the battle for preservation of the environment. environ-ment. The specific suggestions cover the areas of bio-degradeable detergents, deter-gents, recycling, abuse of pesticides, pesti-cides, the power crisis, noise, population, pop-ulation, automobiles, etc. During last fall quarter, students stu-dents in Dr. E.W. Hanley's Biology Bio-logy 102 class decided to practice what had been preached to them. They formulated the idea of taking tak-ing specific environment-saving information in-formation directly to the consumer, con-sumer, hitting him with it in the very place where he can act on the information, the grocery store. The students exhort shoppers to such things as buying only white paper goods, because paper is bio-degradeable, but the dyes f V It ... - - i: '; i' t i-" - i L - : ' 1 ""V? J , . t . ....... ! ; , - ...-r i f I : used in coloring it are not; buying only detergents and cleaners which are low in phosphate, a very common water pollutant; using us-ing re-useable products, returnable bottles, cloth towels and napkins, saving newspapers for re-use etc. Dr. Hanley and interested stu dents started negotiations and in a short time arranged to set up a booth in the Safeway store. According Ac-cording to student Frank Rust the group has so far put $50 and countless man-hours into the project. pro-ject. Art students have printed and painted signs for the group, some for free, some charging only for materials. The $50 has come from the students' own pockets. Store Wants to Help The store's manager, Mr. E. Shelly, gives his reason's for let-' let-' ting the students use his store: "The reason we went along with this is we feel like being a member of the community. Its part of our responsibility, also, to get into the problems we have nowadays. If we can help solve them in any way, then it's our responsibility to do so." Mr. Shelly feels the project has a good potential to initiate positive posi-tive action on the part of consumers. con-sumers. "We have to order products pro-ducts for our shelves to satisfy our customers, and if they want to buy white products, we'll have to order white products." "We've had good customer comment on it. I was a little concerned at first about it, because be-cause the people we have in the area are usually older people, and sometimes they don't see things quite like we do. But they've been exceptionally good and I've had no derogatory comments at all." Other Safeway stores would be interested in having an ecology booth at hand, Mr. Shelly said. He also thinks that the group has reached their "saturation point" at his store, having contacted Dennis Baker, a biology student, talks to customers at a Safeway store convincing them to buy products least harmful to the environment i similar displays. Rust indicated that another booth will open at a store in two weeks, money and manpower willing. "We have a big problem that way," he Said. "We need more volunteers and more, people to contribute." This project is exemplary of the new turn being taken by groups concerned for the environment. Investigators into the problem are coming up with hundreds of concrete, con-crete, practical and often money-saving money-saving ideas which will get the individual consumer involved in the quality of his environment and life. And because of this, people are beginning to care. Concerned With Trash Disposal The Utah Planned Parenthood ' Assn. sponsored an intensive edu- ' cational program during Earth i Day last year. The student-sponsored booth in ,: Safeway has taken an important - first step, however, in taking in- formation to the people, rather ; than depending on the people to i come to them. And at this early i stage, the effort looks successful. : Somebody Had to Do It i As Dr. Hanley, an associate s professor of biology said, "Some- j body had to do it." The sciences, j he said, biology included, are be- ginning to act on the information they gather, rather than just , gather it and file it. j Both the students running the booth and the people taking their recommendations believe their efforts ef-forts will make a difference. Some ; comments by Safeway customers: "I know I will do some of these ; things they say. I'm sure they'll help out." - i "We have to do these little ; things. When we get everybody j doing them, things will get bet , ter." "I know that I personally cant be out in front sluggin' away.M these little things I can do, sol will." - , . i f That is what people think ot these ideas; little things. But one can observe, as they do, that these Kttie things an toed by motives; that ultimately, th E inspired by what supposedly spires most of what men da A genuine concern for the quahtyol human " most of his steady customers already, al-ready, and could do more good at this pointif they moved elsewhere. Illustrate Their Point The students have a table piled high with products illustrating their points, and they hand out pamphlets to passing shoppers, in addition to talking to them. "About half the people we talk to will take items out of their basket, mostly because they didn't want them in the first place," explained Frank Rust while he worked at the display, "they just grab the closest thing they can find, they don't really think too closely about what they buy. They are willing to change." Word about the project has spread, and other stores are asking the students to come in and set up I "" " i . i i .i. .i Cities across the nation have long been concerned with the problem of trash disposal. Coastal communities have been building breakwaters and fishing beds with car bodies. Civil contractors have tried, with mixed results, to use garbage for landfill. But authorities in the field are beginning to recognize that, in the environmental crisis, as in most other things, the consumer rules. And the consumer will have to be persuaded before constructive things will happen on a large scale. One of the first evidences of the trend toward consumer persuasion persu-asion came when a Utah senator released a report on the phosphate content of detergents. The Ecology Eco-logy Center in the Union has since picked up more information of this type, and has made it available avail-able to people. |